All that is Solid … is a radical blog that seeks to promote a future beyond capital's social universe. "All that is solid melts into air" (Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, 'The Communist Manifesto', 1848).

We welcome papers that engage with notions such as populism, democracy, social movements and post-liberalism in relation to a) the structuration of new political formations and b) the changing nature of the notion of the community underpinning the current dominant state-discourse.

Long Abstract

Over the past ten years, arguably as a reaction to the effects of the implementation of neoliberal policies in the region, Latin America has been experiencing a ‘left turn’ signalled by the return of the state in key regulatory functions. The regional picture is by no means homogeneous and includes various exceptions, however, there is consensus among scholar to characterise these developments as something embedded in historical legacies but also as part of a new phenomenon that to an extent challenges old political practices, creates new publics and, in turn, transforms fundamental state-society relationships. In this process, the notion of the community underlying the dominant state discourse has been transformed encompassing broader shifts present in the transition to a post-liberal state. In this panel we welcome papers that conceptually engage with notions such as populism, democracy, social movements, post-liberalism in relation to a) the structuration of new political formations and b) the changing nature of the notion of the community underpinning the current dominant state-discourse.

We have witnessed a renewed interest in the literature on populism vis-à-vis liberal democracies over the recent years. This shared theoretical interest; together with the configuration of a new socio-political context in the region that tends to defy traditional conceptualisations, represent an invitation to critically observe our own analytical tools. The careful consideration of the discursive displacements at stake in notions like community (or the people or the public sphere) will contribute significantly to better our understanding on the depth of recent socio-political transformations.